University of Virginia Library

2. CHAPTER II.

But enough. It is quite impossible to doubt the sincerity
of the Plymouth settlers, the Pilgrims, or Fathers
of New-England, who escaping over sea laid the foundations
of a mighty empire on the perpetual rocks of
New-Plymouth, and along the desolate shores of a new
world, or their belief in witchcraft and sorcery, whatever
we may happen to believe now; for,at a period of sore and
bitter perplexity for them and theirs, while they were yet
wrestling for life, about four hundred of their hardy brave
industrious population were either in prison for the alleged
practice of witchcraft, or under accusation for
matters which were looked upon as fatal evidence thereof.
By referring to the sober and faithful records of
that age, it will be found that in the course of about fifteen
months, while the Fathers of New-England were
beset on every side by the exasperated savages, or by
the more exasperated French, who led the former through
every part of the British-American territory, twenty
eight persons received sentence of death (of which
number nineteen were executed) one died in jail, to whom
our narrative relates, and one was deliberately crushed
to death—according to British law, because forsooth,
being a stout full-hearted man, he would not make a
plea, nor open his mouth to the charge of sorcery, before
the twelve, who up to that hour had permitted no
one who did open his mouth to escape; that a few more
succeeded in getting away before they were capitally
charged; that one hundred and fifty were set free after

the outcry was over; and that full two hundred more of
the accused who were in great peril without knowing it,
were never proceeded against, after the death of the
individual whose character we have attempted a sketch
of, in the following story.

Of these four hundred poor creatures, a large part of
whom were people of good repute in the prime of life,
above two-score made confession of their guilt—and this
although about one half, being privately charged, had no
opportunity for confession. The laws of nature,it would
seem were set aside—if not by Jehovah, at least by the
judges acting under the high and holy sanction of British
law, in this day of sorrow; for at the trial of a woman
who appears to have been celebrated for beauty and
held in great fear because of her temper, both by the
settlers and the savages, three of her children stood up,
and children though they were, in the presence of their
mother, avowed themselves to be witches, and gave a
particular account of their voyages through the air and
over sea, and of the cruel mischief they had perpetrated
by her advice and direction; for she was endowed, say
the records of the day, with great power and prerogative,
and the Father of lies had promised her, at one of
their church-yard gatherings that she should be “Queen
of Hell.”

But before we go further into the particulars of our narrative
which relates to a period when the frightful superstition
we speak of was raging with irresistible power, a
rapid review of so much of the earlier parts of the New-England
history, as immediately concerns the breaking
out, and the growth of a belief in witchcraft among
the settlers of our savage country, may be of use to
the reader, who, but for some such preparation, would
never be able to credit a fiftieth part of what is undoubtedly
true in the following story.

The pilgrims or “Fathers” of New-England, as they
are now called by the writers of America, were but a
ship-load of pious brave men, who while they were in
search of a spot of earth where they might worship their
God without fear, and build up a faith, if so it pleased
him, without reproach, went ashore partly of their own
accord, but more from necessity, in the terrible winter
of 1620-21, upon a rock of Massachusetts-Bay, to which
they gave the name of New-Plymouth, after that of the
port of England from which they embarked.

They left England forever....England their home and
the home of their mighty fathers—turned their backs
forever upon all that was dear to them in their beloved
country, their friends, their houses, their tombs and
their churches, their laws and their literature with all
that other men cared for in that age; and this merely
to avoid persecution for a religious faith; fled away as
it were to the ends of the earth, over a sea the very
name of which was doubtful, toward a shore that was
like a shadow to the navigators of Europe, in search of
a place where they might kneel down before their Father,
and pray to him without molestation.

But, alas for their faith! No sooner had these pilgrims
touched the shore of the new world, no sooner were they
established in comparative power and security, than
they fell upon the Quakers, who had followed them over
the same sea, with the same hope; and scourged and
banished them, and imprisoned them, and put some to
death, for not believing as the new church taught in the
new world. Such is the nature of man! The persecuted
of to-day become the persecutors of to-morrow.
They flourish, not because they are right, but because
they are persecuted; and they persecute because they
have the power, not because they whom they persecute
are wrong.

The quakers died in their belief, and as the great always
die—without a word or a tear; praying for the misguided
people to their last breath, but prophecying heavy
sorrow to them and to theirs—a sorrow without a
name—a wo without a shape, to their whole race forever;
with a mighty series of near and bitter affliction to
the judges of the land, who while they were uttering
the words of death to an aged woman of the Quakers,
(Mary Dyer) were commanded with a loud voice to set
their houses in order, to get ready the accounts of their
stewardship, and to prepare with the priesthood of all
the earth, to go before the Judge of the quick and the
dead. It was the voice of Elizabeth Hutchinson, the
dear and familiar friend of Mary Dyer. She spoke as
one having authority from above, so that all who heard
her were afraid—all! even the judges who were dealing
out their judgment of death upon a fellow creature. And
lo! after a few years, the daughter of the chief judge,
before whom the prophecy had been uttered with such
awful power, was tried for witchcraft and put to death
for witchcraft on the very spot (so says the tradition of
the people) where she stayed to scoff at Mary Dyer,
who was on her way to the scaffold at the time, with
her little withered hands locked upon her bosom....her
grey head lifted up....not bowed in her unspeakable distress....but
lifted up, as if in prayer to something visible
above, something whatever it was, the shadow of which
fell upon the path and walked by the side of the aged
martyr; something whatever it was, that moved like a
spirit over the green smooth turf....now at her elbow,
now high up and afar off....now in the blue, bright air;
something whose holy guardianship was betrayed to the
multitude by the devout slow motion of the eyes that
were about to be extinguished forever.

Not long after the death of the daughter of the chief

judge, another female was executed for witchcraft, and
other stories of a similar nature were spread over the
whole country, to prove that she too had gone out of
her way to scoff at the poor quaker-woman. This occurred
in 1655, only thirty-five years after the arrival
of the Fathers in America. From this period, until 1691,
there were but few trials for witchcraft among the Plymouth
settlers, though the practice of the art was believed
to be common throughout Europe as well as
America, and a persuasion was rooted in the very hearts
of the people, that the prophecy of the quakers and of
Elizabeth Hutchinson would assuredly be accomplished.

It was accomplished. A shadow fell upon the earth
at noon-day. The waters grew dark as midnight. Every
thing alive was quiet with fear—the trees, the birds,
the cattle, the very hearts of men who were gathered
together in the houses of the Lord, every where,
throughout all the land, for worship and for mutual succor.
It was indeed a “Dark Day”—a day never to be
thought of by those who were alive at the time, nor by
their children's children, without fear. The shadow of
the grave was abroad, with a voice like the voice of the
grave. Earthquake, fire, and a furious bright storm
followed; inundation, war and stife in the church.
Stars fell in a shower, heavy cannon were heard in the
deep of the wilderness, low music from the sea—trumpets,
horses, armies, mustering for battle in the deep sea.
Apparitions were met in the high way, people whom
nobody knew, men of a most unearthly stature; evil
spirits going abroad on the sabbath-day. The print of
huge feet and hoof-marks were continually discovered
in the snow in the white sand of the sea-shore—nay, in
the solid rocks and along the steep side of high mountains,

where no mortal hoof could go; and sometimes
they could be traced from roof to roof on the house-tops,
though the buildings were very far apart; and the shape
of Elizabeth Hutchinson herself, was said to have appeared
to a traveller, on the very spot where she and
her large family, after being driven forth out of New-England
by the power of the new church, were put to
death by the savages. He that saw the shape knew it,
and was afraid for the people; for the look of the woman
was a look of wrath, and her speech a speech of
power.

Elizabeth Hutchinson was one of the most extraordinary
women of the age—haughty, ambitious and crafty;
and when it was told every where through the Plymouth
colony that she had appeared to one of the church that
expelled her, they knew that she had come back, to be
seen of the judges and elders, according to her oath,
and were siezed with a deep fear. They knew that she
had been able to draw away from their peculiar mode of
worship, a tithe of their whole number when she was
alive, and a setter forth, if not of strange gods, at least of
strange doctrines: and who should say that her mischievous
power had not been fearfully augmented by
death?

Meanwhile the men of New Plymouth, and of Massachusetts
Bay, had multiplied so that all the neighborhood
was tributary to them, and they were able to send forth
large bodies of their young men to war, six hundred,
seven hundred, and a thousand at a time, year after
year, to fight with Philip of Mount Hope, a royal barbarian,
who had wit enough to make war as the great
men of Europe would make war now, and to persuade
the white people that the prophecy of the Quakers related
to him. It is true enough that he made war like

a savage—and who would not, if he were surrounded as
Philip of Mount Hope was, by a foe whose hatred was
a part of his religion, a part of his very blood and being?
if his territory were ploughed up or laid waste by a superior
foe? if the very wilderness about him were fired
while it was the burial-place and sanctuary of his mighty
fathers? if their form of worship were scouted, and
every grave and every secret place of prayer laid open
to the light, with all their treasures and all their mysteries?
every temple not made with hands, every church
built by the Builder of the Skies, invaded by such a foe
and polluted with the rites of a new faith, or levelled
without mercy—every church and every temple, whether
of rock or wood, whether perpetual from the first, or
planted as the churches and temples of the solitude are,
with leave to perpetuate themselves forever, to renew
their strength and beauty every year and to multiply
themselves on every side forever and ever, in spite of
deluge and fire, storm, strife and earthquake; every
church and every temple whether roofed as the skies
are, and floored as the mountains are, with great clouds
and with huge rocks, or covered in with tree-branches
and paved with fresh turf, lighted with stars and purified
with high winds? Would not the man of Europe
make war now like a savage, and without mercy, if he
were beset by a foe—for such was the foe that Philip of
Mount Hope had to contend with in the fierce pale men
of Massachusetts Bay,—a foe that no weapon of his
could reach, a foe coming up out of the sea with irresistible
power, and with a new shape? What if armies
were to spring up out of the solid earth before the man
of Europe—it would not be more wonderful to him than
it was to the man of America to see armies issuing from
the deep. What if they were to approach in balloons—
or in great ships of the air, armed all over as the foe of
the poor savage appeared to be, when the ships of the
water drew near, charged with thunder and with lightning,
and with four-footed creatures, and with sudden
death? Would the man of Europe make war in such a
case according to what are now called the usages of
war?

The struggle with this haughty savage was regarded
for a time as the wo without a shape, to which the
prophecy referred, the sorrow without a name; for it
occupied the whole force of the country, long and long
after the bow of the red-chief was broken forever, his
people scattered from the face of the earth, and his royalty
reduced to a shadow—a shadow it is true, but still
the shadow of a king; for up to the last hour of his life,
when he died as no king had ever the courage to die, he
showed no sign of terror, betrayed no wish to conciliate
the foe, and smote all that were near without mercy,
whenever they talked of submission; though he had no
hope left, no path for escape, and every shot of the enemy
was fatal to some one of the few that stood near
him. It was a war, which but for the accidental discovery
of a league embracing all the chief tribes of the
north, before they were able to muster their strength
for the meditated blow, would have swept away the
white men, literally to the four winds of heaven, and
left that earth free which they had set up their dominion
over by falsehood and by treachery. By and by however,
just when the issue of that war was near, and the fright
of the pale men over, just when the hearts of the church
had begun to heave with a new hope, and the prophecy
of wrath and sorrow was no longer to be heard in the
market-place, and by the way-side, or wherever the people
were gathered together for business or worship,
with a look of awe and a subdued breath—just when it
came to be no longer thought of nor cared for by the

judges and the elders, to whom week after week and
year after year, it had been a familiar proverb of death
(if bad news from the war had come over night, or news
of trouble to the church, at home or abroad, in Europe
or in America) they saw it suddenly and wholly accomplished
before their faces—every word of it and every
letter.

The shadow of the destroyer went by....the type was
no more. But lo! in the stead thereof, while every
mother was happy, and every father in peace, and every
child asleep in security, because the shadow and the
type had gone by—lo! the Destroyer himself appeared!
The shadow of death gave way for the visage of death
—filling every heart with terror, and every house with
lamentation. The people cried out for fear, as with one
voice. They prayed as with one prayer. They had no
hope; for they saw the children of those who had offered
outrage to the poor quaker-woman gathered up, on
every side, from the rest of the people, and after a few
days and a brief inquiry, afflicted in their turn with reproach
and outcry, with misery, torture and cruel death;
—and when they saw this, they thought of the speech of
Elizabeth Hutehinson before the priesthood of the land,
the judges and the people, when they drove her out from
among them, because of her new faith, and left her to
perish for it in the depth of a howling wilderness; her,
and her babes, and her beautiful daughter, and her two
or three brave disciples, away from hope and afar from
succor;—and as they thought of this, they were filled
anew with unspeakable dread: for Mary Dyer and Elizabeth
Hutchinson, were they not familiar, and very dear
friends? were they not sisters in life, and sisters in
death? gifted alike with a spirit of sure prophecy, though
of a different faith? and martyrs alike to the church?